Travelling grate condition monitoring

A system for monitoring a condition of a travelling grate machine, in particular a pelletizing or sintering machine, said travelling grate machine comprising a plurality of pallet cars comprising a car body with wheels, side walls and a perforate floor with a plurality of grate bars, the system comprising:

• identification means for univocally identifying each individual pallet car among the plurality of pallet cars as the plurality of pallet cars traverse the travelling grate machine;
• sensor means for continuously collecting a plurality of condition indicating parameters, as the plurality of pallet cars traverse the travelling grate machine, before performing maintenance or emergency stoppage of the travelling grate machine, wherein said sensor means comprises:
• a first sensor means for collecting first condition indicating parameters indicative of a condition of the wheels of the pallet car;
• a second sensor means for collecting second condition indicating parameters indicative of a condition of the grate bars of the pallet car;
• and
• a third sensor means for collecting third condition indicating parameters indicative of a condition of the car body and/or side walls of the pallet car;
• processor means for attributing the collected first, second and third condition indicating parameters to the individual pallet car;
• storage means for storing the collected first, second and third condition indicating parameters for the individual pallet car in a database;
• evaluation means executed by the processor means for evaluating the condition of the travelling grate machine as the plurality of pallet cars traverse the travelling grate machine, wherein said evaluation means comprises:
• compares the first, second and third condition indicating parameters collected by the first, second and third sensor means of each pallet car to reference parameters and/or to previously collected condition indicating parameters of that the individual pallet car;
• identifies faults in each pallet car based on this comparison;
• classifies each pallet car according to a need of maintenance based on a severity of the identified faults;
• and
• determines a damaged pallet car among the plurality of pallet cars having a greatest need of maintenance based on this classification;
• and
• wherein the processor means controls the travelling grate machine to perform an emergency stoppage that stops the traversing of the plurality of pallet cars in response to determining the damaged pallet car.